New Year's resolution: Commitment, consistency key to making fitness stick

Jo Ciavaglia @JoCiavaglia

Wednesday

Dec 26, 2018 at 9:30 AMDec 26, 2018 at 9:34 AM

Regular exercise is consistently one of the most popular resolutions that people make at the start of the year. It’s also consistently one of the first ones that people break, according to fitness experts.

Not long ago, Robert Golashov couldn’t walk up four flights of stairs before he had to stop.

“My body just would not do it,” he said.

His knees ached. He needed drugs to control his high cholesterol. His blood pressure was headed in the wrong direction. He wore a size 42 pants.

But rather than give up, the Doylestown Township resident got up. He joined a gym and hired a personal trainer. He had a plan to lose 60 pounds.

It took a year, but he lost the weight.

But changes in diet and exercise were only part of the reason the 67-year-old Golashov believes he succeeded. Changing his attitude was the biggest key.

“You’ve got to want to do it,” he said. “Most of this is mental.”

Regular exercise is consistently one of the most popular resolutions that people make at the start of the year. It’s also consistently one of the first ones that people break, according to fitness experts.

Starting around Thanksgiving and continuing into January, health and fitness centers report seeing memberships spike — and absent members return. But those crowds start to thin before the end of March. So what happens?

Life happens, according to Linda Murray. Often followed by a trail of excuses, she quickly added.

For 26 years, Murray has been a wellness coach and personal trainer at the YMCA in Mount Laurel. She is 63 and teaches 16 exercise classes a week.

She has seen a lot of New Year’s resolutions come, and go. What makes the difference, she and other fitness trainers interviewed said, comes down to two things: commitment and consistency.

“With everything, you have to do it for 28 days to maintain a habit,” Murray said. “If you don’t continue to do that at least twice a week it does not become part of your routine.”

Personal fitness trainers interviewed unanimously agreed that too much enthusiasm is the biggest motivation killer for people starting a new exercise program.

“What I see happens a lot is people go overboard in the beginning and they burn out,” said Aesha Tahir, a personal trainer in Doylestown Township. “That is something people don’t realize.”

Tahir tells her clients to keep their workout routine simple. Break it up into 10-, 15- or 20-minute segments two or three times a day.

Consistency is key, she said. She recommends not just the same day, but the same time to work out. Pick an activity you enjoy doing since you are more likely to stick with it.

Trainer Jackie Krosnodomskie doesn’t push immediate drastic diet changes with her new clients, especially the ones she doesn’t think are fully committed to a lifestyle change.

“It’s too much,” said Krosnodomskie, who also works at the Mount Laurel YMCA. “I personally think it’s too much. Getting them going is number one, then start looking at cutting back on portions.”

Overthinking a commitment to exercise is often the biggest hurdle for clients, she added.

“It’s like a wheel going on in your brain. You can think your way in and out of something rather than just doing it,” she said. “Make fitness about making you better, not about ‘needing to be that size.’ I don’t think that is where the mentality should start.”

A good way to keep clients motivated to make long-term lifestyle changes is having a plan in place beforehand, said Trisha Waugh, a personal trainer and fitness instructor at Cornerstone Fitness in Doylestown Township.

Many gyms and fitness centers have wellness staff who can help create a workable individual program and show people the proper way to use fitness equipment, Waugh said.

The buddy-system can keep people on track, Waugh and other trainers said. People are less likely to skip a workout if they know someone is waiting on them, or if they are paying for it.

Waugh said she will call clients at night to check if they are keeping to their routine.

“I hold them accountable,” she said. “I like to think we’re in this together.”

When Golashov first started as a client, Waugh recalled he committed himself to incorporating exercise into his everyday life. But the one thing he insisted he would never do is run.

Now he runs up and down the hill behind Cornerstone.

“But she runs with me, so it’s not bad,” Golashov said.

After dropping the weight, he achieved another goal to climb to the top of the Eiffel Tower, a feat he completed 18 months ago. He also climbed the 500 steps of the Arc de Triomphe.

Golashov said he works out four days a week for an hour and he focuses on muscle building. Maintaining his weight loss isn’t the only benefit he has enjoyed, either.

His blood pressure is back to normal. He no longer takes any medications. He can get up and down off the floor without help or pain.

After more than two years, exercise is now just part of his daily routine.

“I’ll never stop now.”

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